Too Popular To Sell? FDA Committee Calls For Ban on Menthol-Flavored Cigarettes

FDA advisory group called the Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee has asked the Administration to bar the sale of menthol cigarettes as a danger to human health. The reason? They are too popular. I do not smoke and I do not like smoking. However, I find it increasingly bizarre to ban products because people like them too much. If the Administration wants to seek a prohibition of tobacco, there are good faith reasons to do so. However, most Americans continue to believe that adults have a right to choose to smoke. If tobacco is legal, I do not see why citizens should be barred from buying the type of tobacco that they prefer.

The Committee insists that menthol-flavored cigarettes are too popular with children and African Americans. Much of the recommendation focuses on adults who are African-American, Hispanic as well as other ethnic and racial minorities. However, the Committee does not find any greater health risk of the product itself. Rather, they are so popular that they are likely to increase smoking: “The availability of menthol cigarettes leads to an increase in the number of cigarette smokers and the burden of premature mortality.”

The message seems to be: you can sell tobacco products unless they are too popular with consumers.

Unless there is some added health risk associated with menthol-flavoring, I have serious reservations about telling my neighbors that they cannot buy these cigarettes . . . as long as they do not smoke them in my house.

Source: Chart found on Reddit

Jonathan Turley